Christmas in March

Tonight I was in a grocery store.

Christmas music was playing in the background: instrumental renditions of "Rudolph," "Oh, Holy Night," and other mundane songs that we have to put up with for several months during the dark days of Winter.  

Hearing about the Great Hallmark Holiday and mommy kissing Santa Claus on the Ides of March was a very, very disturbing experience for me. 

I'm one of those terribly polite people who virtually never complain to managers or any staff about the quality of their business.  I've been served cold meals, wrong meals, over-charged, under-charged, and many glasses of expired beer;   I keep my mouth shut, for I forgive human beings for making honest mistakes.  

But tonight I was so disturbed by hearing Christmas music in March that I complained to the manager of the grocery store, and to two other employees.  The manager knew something was wrong.  The two regular employees didn't even realize that Christmas music was playing in the background. 

Perhaps I was so disturbed because hearing the music confirmed my scornful hypothesis that Christmas is starting earlier and earlier every year, so that profit-driven people make more money off of our dumb-asses that buy into Hallmark Holidays.   

When I was a child, you couldn't really do Christmas until Thanksgiving was over.  And now, the trivial sales and the 4/4 key-of-C songs start virtually in October.   I've been saying for years, (partially tongue-in-cheek) that Christmas will soon start even sooner, and in a couple of decades, it will be year-round.  My experience tonight in the grocery store confirmed my idea that some would call a paranoid delusion.  It was like an experience similar to what George Orwell must have felt had he been magically supplanted into 1984.

As always, this blog post is not *really* about hearing Christmas music in March.  It's about a deeper sociocultural problem.  Shall we discuss this further below?  :)

The New Pope and Feminism

I've known a number of Catholics in my life.  

It always astonishes me to meet Catholics who are intelligent, educated, and modern, especially those of the female variety.

I pose to them a simple question:  Do you think men are superior to women?

I do not think this to be true, and usually they don't either.  We are all equal creatures under the eyes of God.

But wait… why can't women be priests?  Are they not prepared to receive God's holy knowledge?  

Why are testicles and a penis a prerequisite for knowing The Divine, and spreading The Divine to our human species? 

Among other things, The Catholic Church is completely sexist.  It is a relic of an old way of thinking and living, where women stayed home and made babies while men did more noble things.  

The media coverage of the newly "elected" Pope upsets me.  The day that a female Pope is elected is the day that Catholicism deserves to make the newspapers in a positive way.  

But that will never happen…

Is it not the time we take a strong stance against archaic, sexist, racist, and classist thinking in our culture?  Is it not the time we acknowledge how marvelous, miraculous, and special human life is, and abandon systems of thought, like Catholicism (and religion), that run contrary to this?   

Call me a liberal, a polemic, a hippy, an atheist, a Marxist, a feminist… for I embrace one label, and that is, a Humanist.  And I see the sexism, pedophilia, ethnocentrism, and corruption of the Catholic Church to be anti-humanist.  And I plead to you, my brothers and sisters, to stand up against such things.

   

Apple Introduces iPhone 6: The first phone-gun hybrid

Apple introduces iPhone 6:  The first phone-gun hybrid. 

January 24^th, 2015

Cupertino, CA

Today, representatives from Apple unveiled the much anticipated re-thinking of their revolutionary smartphone.  A new generation is born: iPhone 6.  Some may actually call it the iPhone 6-Shooter.

In addition to the new and intuitive design and interface, this phone comes with a controversial new app called iGun.  iGun allows the user to fire real bullets, much similar to a real gun.  Six rounds can be loaded into the phone at once, and fired at the speed and frequency of a semi-automatic handgun.  Apple claims that the app is for self-defense purposes only. Apple likewise claims no malicious intent:  “… the iGun upgrade is simply a result of the market:  likely consumers want both a smart phone and a tool for self-defense,” said Alex Jones of the Apple Press Ministry. 

Anti-gun groups have already released statements, and plan to use their recently abridged constitutional rights to take the issue to court. Many consumers are hesitant.  Some iPhone 5s users and Apple devotees have vowed to not purchase the upgrade, and even to boycott Apple.

In November of 2013, The National Rifle Association acquired 34% of Apple’s stock.  Left Wing blogs and Anti-Gun groups claim that the iGun is a direct result of this so-called “take-over.”  Apple’s CEO and Chairmen did not respond to requests for comment on this matter.  NRA Executive Vice President Paul Ryan could likewise not be reached for comment as he is currently on a campaign tour in Ohio. 

The iPhone 6 is scheduled to be released next month.  Demonstrations against the device are being planned; use the internet to find a grass roots organization or protest near you.